Alan Faena's Argentine Residence

The restoration of the businessman's Argentine estancia is a touchstone for an ambitious new real estate development that he hopes will change Miami.

ENLARGE

HORSE MAJEURE | Faena, Ximena Caminos and their son, Noa, at their estancia in Argentina.
Photography by Todd Eberle

By

Elisa Lipsky-Karasz

Updated May 21, 2013 12:16 p.m. ET

ONE HUNDRED miles from Buenos Aires, deep in the Argentine pampas, at the end of a dirt road that runs through miles of harvest-ready corn and indigenous ombú trees, stands an incongruously ornate white gate. Behind the gate an elegant allée of trees leads, in turn, to more allées of ancient oaks unfurling in precise diagonals.

And across an expansive lawn a white greyhound bounds behind a Gatsby-like figure clad in white from the top of his feathered hat to the hem of his breeches: Argentine fashion designer–turned–real estate developer Alan Faena.

When Faena bought this historic estancia, known as San Juan de Vasquez, in 2005, along with its 2,500 acres of fertile farmland, the place had fallen into disrepair with the declining fortunes of the large Catholic family that owned it. Faena insisted that its 200-year-old paintings and other family heirlooms be kept intact and then spent two years carefully restoring it to its former grandeur, while also incorporating his own flair for dramatic decorative touches: walls painted a rich red, gold-trimmed velvet curtains and immense gilded sconces. Across the lawn he installed an immense decorative fountain that has the same long footprint as the house.

Photos: Pride of the Pampas

Click to view slideshow. Photography by Todd Eberle

Reinvention on this scale is Faena's specialty. The ambitious restoration recalls what he'd done for the Puerto Madero district of Buenos Aires, a project he began 10 years ago. Before Faena—the 49-year-old son of a second-generation Syrian Jewish textile manufacturer—Puerto Madero was just another stretch of urban wasteland. Wedged on a narrow spit of land near the marshy flatlands of the Rio de la Plata, the abandoned docklands had no streets, a few gutted buildings and "chest-high grass," Austin Hearst, an early investor, remembers. "It looked like a junkyard with wild dogs," adds Hearst's then-partner, entrepreneur Christopher Burch. "If you tried to create the worst possible real estate in the world, this was it."

Faena saw in this impoverished landscape the potential for "a building where music, art, culture, service, flavor, knowledge, love and freedom can all come together." Aiming to create something that would "expand people's lives," he coaxed architect Philippe Starck into designing his first South American project—transforming a 100-year-old grain depository into a hotel. A local group of architects converted an abandoned mill into an arts center. He also invited Lord Norman Foster's firm, Foster & Partners, to design a residential condominium—also his first in South America. The $200 million project resulted in some of the most expensive real estate in Buenos Aires, and copycat developers quickly followed suit. Today the neighborhood resembles a South American version of Tribeca. "We created a place out of nothing," says Faena.

‘"We believe we can have different cities of the world enjoy our way of doing things—this new way of development that blurs art, culture and music." ’

——Alan Faena

Now he hopes to repeat this success in Miami. With his partner, Russian-born billionaire Leonard Blavatnik, he has bought up four city blocks along South Beach's Collins Avenue, including the '40s-era Saxony Hotel, and enlisted a roster of A-list talent to construct another Faena district. Foster is again designing residential condominiums, while Rem Koolhaas's firm, OMA, will create an arts center, retail spaces and a high-tech parking garage. The renamed Faena Hotel will be refurbished by designers Roman and Williams, whose resumé includes New York City hot spots The Standard and the Ace Hotel.

Although the asking price of the penthouse in the Foster structure is a mind-boggling $50 million—$16 million more than the previous South Beach record—for Faena, the project isn't merely about developing real estate to sell to the highest bidder. He sees his efforts in more grandiose terms and has taken to calling his creative partners the "Collaboratory, a laboratory of collaborations." He adds: "It's the first time that a voice is arriving from the south to North America—and it's not only my voice, but the voice of the entire region. So we feel responsible for that flag—all the messages, the feelings, our mentality, our music, our dancing, our way of living."

The way of living he hopes to export isn't the cultural pastiche of gauchos and asados one might encounter at Epcot (though there will be a version of his Buenos Aires tango show), but instead embraces simple ideas, like the indoor-outdoor living in which he revels. Faena is fiercely proud of the Foster condominium's balconies, which rival the interior living spaces, which range from 1,307 to 4,730 square feet. These were inspired in part by his estancia, where he surrounded the original house with wide aleros, verandas sheltered by eaves. Designed by Brandon Haw—the architect who oversaw the residential towers in Buenos Aires—the Miami aleros will boast aerodynamic white curves built by the same company that constructed the metal skin on Frank Gehry's Walt Disney Concert Hall in Los Angeles. "It's a translation of his kind of lifestyle," says Haw. "He's a dreamer, and he has a vision of the world he wants to create." Faena adds: "It's not about a building, it's not about making a hotel. The most interesting thing is curating a neighborhood."

"I thought the development needed to be a premium project with an exciting legacy, and that's Alan," says Blavatnik. "Alan thinks big," says Robin Standefer, cofounder of Roman and Williams. So in addition to the simplicity of generous balconies and a wider-than-usual stretch of gardens (designed by Miami landscape architect Raymond Jungles), Faena would like the new hotel to evoke the resorts of the French Riviera's golden era. Its eclectic ethos—from a sleek yacht-like restaurant to a formal, palatial living room—will reflect the amalgamation of styles at his estancia. "Everyone who came to Argentina took the best from Italy, France, Spain and made a mixture," he says. Adds Standefer: "Working with him is very much about the visual effect that a space will have on someone."

‘"The best way to remodel a house is to understand it. Many people just bring in an architect, then realize that it doesn't fit the spirit or soul of the place." ’

——Faena

"He has a lot of passion," says Blavatnik. That dynamism made his unlikely real estate career possible in the first place. "He had enough charisma to get me to invest when investing in an Argentine hotel was the last thing I was thinking of," says Burch. "He threw his arm around me and said, 'Chreees, I have a veeeesion.' " Hearst adds: "As an entrepreneur, you are looking for a vision, a visionary and an opportunity. And even though Alan had never been in the hotel or real estate business, he had an unbelievable clarity of vision—I'll never forget, in 2000, he walked me through this gutted brick structure and was describing the color of the curtains, the type of wood floor, the long bench in the entrance."

This confidence later won over OMA's New York director Shohei Shigematsu. "He's not really a developer, an artist or a strategist, but we were very intrigued by his commercial success, even in a shrinking economy like Argentina's, and his commitment," he says. Faena's passionate rhetoric—a homespun philosophy that's a mix of vaguely New Age ideas, Argentine patriotism, a deep respect for nature and a touch of Scarface drug lord Tony Montana—and his habit of dressing in a uniform of all white, with loosely buttoned shirts and befeathered hats only made him more interesting to Koolhaas's firm. "We deal with typical developers all the time. But Alan is an ideal figure for an architect to work with—once he buys in, he goes all the way."

FAENA THRIVES ON the force of his own creativity—a giant billboard outside his Buenos Aires offices reminds visitors of "The Power of Ideas." An autodidact who never attended university, he launched his fashion company, Via Vai, at age 19, in 1986 with 50 boldly colored T-shirts that he funded himself. They quickly sold, and taking advantage of lenient Argentine credit policies, he was able to expand his collections without asking his family for financial support. Soon, he was designing ready-to-wear collections and a jeans line—both of which proved popular among Argentines reveling in their liberation from a dictatorial military junta. Ever the showman, he staged theatrical fashion shows for audiences of thousands.

By the early '90s, while Faena was becoming a local celebrity, his father's once-thriving wool textile company crumbled as the Argentine government dramatically reduced import tariffs, creating a sudden influx of cheaper fabrics. Via Vai, however, continued to grow, eventually reaching $30 million in annual revenues, with 80 stores nationwide. In 1996, sensing another downturn in the volatile economy, Faena sold Via Vai. (It soon shuttered.)

At 32, Faena retreated from public life and became an avid gardener, living full time at his beach house in Punta del Este, Uruguay, where he cultivated the Faena rose, the inspiration behind the red found throughout his hotels and the estancia. Faena's style is apparent in other decorative touches, including a credo of his own invention—LOVE, TRUTH, FREEDOM—etched in the ceiling of the estancia on a gilded molding inspired by Napoleon III's Parisian apartment. That motto also adorns the gold rings worn by Faena and Ximena Caminos, the mother of his 3-year-old son, Noa. Caminos, who met Faena in 2003 when she was working at the Museo de Arte Latinoamericano de Buenos Aires, is the executive director of the Faena Arts Center; the two visited the estancia for a year before beginning the restoration. "The best way to remodel a house is to understand it. There are so many people who just bring in an architect, and then realize that it doesn't fit the spirit or the soul of the place," he says. "It's important to understand the places to then see how to make them grow. I approach the creation of a district the same way."

Faena and Caminos have carefully preserved the house's history while unearthing its potential. Where there were once nine cramped bedrooms and two small bathrooms, there are now four generous suites. An interior courtyard that the previous owners had covered with a makeshift roof to create additional living space was opened up to let in sunlight with plantings of lime and orange trees. The couple preserved many of the house's original details, from the original cedar paneling in the dining room to its ornately tiled floors. Ancestral heirlooms have been carefully preserved and displayed, from family oil portraits to photo books and documents about the estate's chapel, which was built in the '50s and blessed by Pope Pius XII. A converted stable now serves as a guesthouse that neighbors a pool and state-of-the-art gym.

Faena is most proud of the land, so rich that black loam is reclaiming the area's few paved roads. He is also attempting what he says will be the pampas's first vintage, if it succeeds: a cabernet sauvignon to match the Faena Malbecs he already produces in the nearby Mendoza region. In addition to an aviary of pheasants and peacocks, Faena owns a pack of white greyhounds, many descendants of his first, Prince, now 5 years old. Purchased during a trip to New York, Prince joined the Faena family at their suite in the Carlyle hotel. "We didn't know they allowed animals," says Caminos, laughing, "so we were smuggling this puppy in and out of the hotel for three days." Bred for competitive racing, he has sired many of Faena's eight other greyhounds, who are exercised twice a day by a caretaker who leads them around the property with a horse-drawn cart.

With the hotel and the Foster condos scheduled for completion in fall 2014, Faena will soon see if his grand vision can succeed in America. "We believe we can have different cities of the world enjoy our way of doing things, with this new way of development that blurs art, culture and music," says Faena. "This is what drives me—creating your own dreams and ideas, against all odds." He pauses and looks out at the neighborhood he built. "I think the most interesting thing is how you play with the most fantastic places in the world but not doing what everybody does—doing it your way."

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